#jewish dæmons

[hyperpotamianarch]

All right. So, first: if you are either Jewish, like His Dark Materials, or both, please reblog. If you aren't any of those but know someone who is - please share it with them. I want to get as many thoughts on this as possible.

In essence, I just want to ask two simple questions. I have the beginnings of answers for myself, but Judaism is nothing if not full of discourse and many opinions on one topic. So, again: reblog. Share your thoughts and opinions. Hopefully, it will give us a wide variety of possibilities and answers.

The two questions are: where are Jews in Lyra's world? And what are the theological and Halachic concequences of having dæmons?

I intend to share my opinions in two separate reblogs, but please share your thoughts even if you don't see mine. The short version is that I looked about events in Jewish history around John Calvin's time for the first question (pope John Calvin being the major alternation of history in HDM). As for the second question - I have some thoughts relating to the Chabad thought stream. Elaborations, again, going in reblogs.

Thank you in advance!

(PS, question number 1 was handled once by the sadly deactivvated user the Tea Detective, though their full post disappeared. Link to a reblogging of the first half: here. Note, another reblog mentions other religions - feel free to discuss them, I'm focusing on Judaism because I'm Jewish. Another post asking this question was posted here, so have fun with it. Meanwhile, this post is about dæmons and religions in general and lightly touches Judaism.)

[knifebearer]

my name is shiloh silvertongue and im a jewish disabled queer guy living in the northwestern US. 🌈

i love toys, old retro game systems, and most of all, you! 💛 im a kid-at-heart, furry, and filled with love. :) i'm nervous to talk to people but i love making new friends!!! please don't be afraid to reach out to me, i won't eat your lunch, i promise. 🫂

this blog is mostly sfw but i curse and talk about nsfw (not in detail) sometimes, because despite how old i am in my head, i'm still an adult. :) not strictly 18+ (adults only) but please be safe.

TAGS:

#diary: my personal posts and photos.

#my art: self explanatory.

#self ship: not used much anymore, but stuff for my self insert x canon types of posts.

#selfies: not used frequently (only in reblogs) due to bots and horny old men.

#logan: posts about the guy in my head.

#yarahel: my dæmon. :)

ABOUT ME:

hi. im shiloh. :) i use it/he/they pronouns and i live in the northwestern us, in a big-for-my-state city. my favorite things to do are going to the library and taking the bus places.

im also alterhuman and my biggest kintype is lyra silvertongue from his dark materials, by philip pullman. i read the book series when i was 14 and it fundimentally changed my brain chemistry.

i have autism (level 2) and being independant is something i struggle with a lot. please be patient with me! im still figuring things out about myself. :)

MY SPECIAL INTERESTS:

His Dark Materials by Phillip Pullman

Nature/Animals (with a focus on whales, birds, and horses specifically.)

Stuffed Animals and Toys

My Fandom Stuff:

His Dark Materials by Philip Pullman

Dragon Age

Baldur's Gate 3

Epic: The Musical

The Phantom of the Opera

X-Men

and others im probably forgetting.

follow my wife | follow my boyfriend

[chiaroscuro-daemons]

Black & White Sunrise

We are a multidæ subsystem within a larger plural system. Zohar is the dæmian, Praxis & Syntyche are the dæmons. Below is some information about us!

Zohar Arcturus Morgenstern

System outernaut of the Sidereal Prismatic Reverie Symphony

CIEday: September 12, 2022

Chalkydri angel extranth, bear folcintera, Paladin & Morningstar archetrope

He/hymn/it/e/dei/sol

Bodily 21; Mentally ~6000

Prospective Jewish convert

Interested in philosophy, folklore, religion, alterhumanity, dæmonism, learning, writing, reading, music, poetry

tag: #knightlight 🕯️

Praxis

CIEday: May 31st 2023 (the day when Zo formally recognized his existence, but he's existed in many forms before then)

Settled form: Common blackbird

He/him

Tag: #practical poet 🐦‍⬛

Syntyche Lynet Arete

CIEday: August 22nd 2023 (when Zo & Praxis formally acknowledged her existence, has existed for a long time in many forms)

She/they

Tag: #wild rose whispers 🕊️

[leshonksaf]

shiloh. it/he/they. spirituality sideblog.

animist. jewish. half-hearted pantheist. agnostic but only twards the christian god in specific. pagan. ect ect ect.

tags:

ashes to ashes: posts about Dust, as in Dust from his dark materials by philip pullman. i believe in it very literally in that it is concious and it makes up the human soul.

tell them stories: death, ancestors, human culture, and artwork.

transformation: posts about how change is sacred.

this is not for you: the sancitity of the house, the spirits that inhabit it, and what makes it alive.

the point of it all: posts about love, and humanity's innate goodness.

little talks: tag for my dæmon and soul, yarahel.

@knifebearer is my main account. :)

[alethiosr]

hello !!! i wanted to share that i came across your blog recently and we share rather similar beliefs regarding his dark materials in a more spiritual sense; i joke that the books are my bible rather frequently, but i sort of mean it literally .

there are a few differences, obviously, i'm jewish and an animist alongside my personal spirituality regarding the books . my belief personally is that the god that is responsible for our creation is Dust itself, rather than a tangible man-in-the-sky sort of omnipotent deity . so, god is Dust, at least to me . that's how i make sense of it, anyways .

i have a spiritual relationship with my dæmon as well . she's sort of my other half very literally, as in, from the book's view on dæmons as souls . her name is yarahel and she is a barn owl most've the time .

it's very nice to see someone with shared views about Dust, HDM, and everything related to it .

i hope you & fallon have a good break, thank you for your thoughts !!!!

Hello! I cannot explain just how excited and happy receiving this ask made me when I got the notification. I’ve been in a lull unsure of what I was doing and looking for answers. Getting this ask really feels like some sort of sign I’m on the right path.

The books are the closest thing to a Bible to me. Though maybe not as Christians are notoriously bad at taking the Bible seriously and listening to it. Sometimes I feel I’m a bit crazy for taking the books so seriously as if they were nonfiction. It’s nice hearing from someone who’s the same.

I’m not Jewish, but I’m from a Jewish family and draw a lot of ideas from Judaism. I am also an animist, though it’s more of a background belief that uplifts some of my central ones. I’m not entirely sure what to make of Dust, I think there’s still more to uncover about it. It seems like the final book in The Book Of Dust is going to reveal something important, whether about Dust or daemons. To me Dust seems too comprehensible for it to be God, at least if we define God as the creator of the universe itself. All interpretations are meaningful though and I think the idea of Dust as God does make a lot of sense.

It’s nice to hear I’m not the only one who sees daemons as the same as they were written. Most people don’t and while that is of course none of my concern, it does get frustrating and lonely after a while. Yours has a wonderful name.

If you ever want to talk further about these topics you’re always welcome. It really was a pleasure to receive this.

[simchat]

shiloh (שִׁלֹה) | it/he | adult

spirituality/religion sideblog.

posts here either are in some part related to my beliefs, or are part of a digital shrine to my spirit friends.

jewish animist. monolatrist. agnostic. half-hearted pantheist. pagan.

i live in montana, and im rather connected to the land here. yellowstone especially.

tags:

ashes to ashes: posts about Dust, as in Dust from his dark materials by philip pullman. i believe in it very literally, and that it is G-d, rather than a tangible being.

father of man: posts about G-d in a more typical manner.

transformation: posts about how change is sacred.

the point of it all: posts about love, and humanity's innate goodness.

tell them stories: death, ancestors, human culture, and artwork.

this is not for you: the sancitity of the house, the spirits that inhabit it, and what makes it alive.

the mustang: for my guide and tutletary animal.

little talks: for my dæmon, yarahel.

more to be added

my main blog is @internetfriend, if you want to follow me there for other purposes.

[jollysunflora]

Are there any bible stories you'd wanna read re a dæmon AU? Please let me know.

[61below]

*banging pots and pans* READ! THIS! FIC! This!! This is hands down the best dæmon!AU I’ve ever read.

[cuteasamuntin]

WIP Ask Game of Shame

Tagged by @gosh-emperor who loves me and supports my stuff and nonsense even though most of the time we’re working out of totally different fandoms

Rules: Post the names of all the files in your WIP folder, regardless of how non-descriptive or ridiculous. Send me an ask with the title that most intrigues you and I’ll post a little snippet of it or tell you something about it. And then tag as many people as you have WIPs.

I’ve opted to only list fics with titles, as there are also another two dozen snippets and vague ideas that don’t have a name or extensive notation in my notes folders. If anyone would like to run with any of these ideas or inquire after the untitled works in my notes for possible adaptation, please feel free! All I ask is you tag my AO3 (also CuteAsAMuntin) when you post.

Scrivener Fics Folder:

The Witcher with the Mouth (Spideypool Witcher AU - witcher!Wade)

Wilson (Expensive Mistakes) (Spideypool song fic)

Caged-Up Animal pts. 4-14 & interludes 1-6 (Spideypool chastity plus poly)

The Sorrows of Young Wilson (Peter/Wade/Vanessa tropey a/b/o with nb/trans-secondary-gender Wade)

The New Sufferings of Young WWW (sequel to TSoYW)

Deterrent (Spideypool BDSM AU)

Google Docs Fics Folder:

Postlude: Inamorato (Spideypool, little epilogue to Aftermath)

Hung Like the Pelt of Some Prey (Teratober 2021 Collection)

What If… Venom Possessed Deadpool? (pre-Spideypool)

Mary Jane: Blue (MJ/Peter Parker)

Fics with extensive notes but no document of their own:

Spideypool:

What If… Venompool Fought Spider-Man

Chanukah (Baby Please Come Home) (Wade and Ellie have their first Chanukah with Peter)

The Scarlet Spider (Spideypool Witcher AU - witcher!Peter)

Dust to Dust (dæmon AU)

Nice Jewish Boyfriend (Wade tries to get circumcised for his conversion)

Spidey Meets Pool, Spidey Wants Pool, Spidey Loses Pool, Spidey Gets Pool (exactly what it sounds like)

Memento Mori (every Spider-Person since Peter has Deadpool)

Attack Dog (not a dog fic)

Don’t Ruin This (Peter was trapped in his own head by Doc Ock for months, and Wade never noticed)

Don’t Call It a Team-Up (being totally cool and chill about that crush)

Timelines (Wade gets knocked around the multiverse)

Spider-Man: Home to Roost (MCU!Spidey meets movie!Deadpool)

Free Wade (Free Guy AU - also a Peter/Gwen fic)

The Witcher:

A Matter of Degrees (Yenralt post Geralt being assaulted by Triss)

The Waters of Brokilon (Yenralt with some smut in my feelings)

Rip My Ribcage Open (Yenralt pegging)

A Witcher and a Sorceress Run into a Bard (Geryenskier)

Not My Immortal (Geryenskier inversion of the fandom trope of immortal!Jaskier)

Other:

What If Spider-Man Stayed in Boston? (Peter/Wade/Vanessa)

Dust to Dust: My Name Jeff (Gwenpool meets her dæmon, Jeff the Land Shark)

What If… Lady Deadpool Met Her Heartmate? (Wanda Wilson/Miguel O’Hara - alternate title: In Every Universe)

Festival of Lights (6-7 part series about celebrating various holidays that can be referred to as a “festival of lights” featuring Marvel characters)

What If… Peter and Mary Jane Had Stayed in Portland? (Peter/MJ - alternate title: Ask Your Local Ordained Rabbi)

Imprints (Peter/Wade/Vanessa a/b/o where Peter had a thing for Wade then he and Vanessa imprint on each other)

Hermione Granger and the Pegging of the Scion of Malfoy (Dramione)

Everything Looks Like a Nail (Wade/Weasel, semi follow-up to When All You Have Is a Hammer)

Check Hook (Spideydevil 1920s boxing AU)

It’s Practically Canon: or, How Not to Build a Superhero Polycule (poly Wade, serial monogamist Peter, and their partners)

Captain American Library Association (Stucky librarian AU)

They’re Only in the Southwest, and Other Stuff You Should Know (Runaways fic - Gert starts a podcast)

What If… Gwen Stacy Didn’t Die? (Gwen/Peter/MJ)

The Inherent Eroticism of Loyalty (original fiction about a forgotten deity regaining power)

I am absolutely not tagging FORTY-ONE people, but I will tag some folks whose work and/or blogs I enjoy because I am a NOSY FAN, and anyone else who would like to post this should feel free to consider themself tagged: @full-fledged-cumberbitch, @waterme-stories, @thekenwick, @jackironsides, @umbraastaff, @lazarusemma, @feminine-duck, @battlecries-dear, @herbgerblin, @copperbadge, @mikazure, @icannotreadcursive, @ruffboijuliaburnsides, @deputychairman, @natalieironside, @dandelionslute, @pillage-and-lute, @tsukiwolf42 , @fantasticstoryteller, @traincat, @dycefic, @beforejuko, @lovesbitca8, @themadkatter13, @mscaptainwinchester, @breedlejuice-writes, @gement, @cheermione, @li-izumi, @not-close-to-straight, @sordid-details-following, @lunastories, @dramamineontopofme, @wolfdrawer, @atemy, @albeenocookie, @dropthebeet-ao3, @serpentinhiding

[radiocmyk]

Interesting daimon updates:

1. Remembered that in Jewish folklore, you’re supposed to leave your window open or shedim will get trapped in your house, and there’s certain things you’re not supposed to do to avoid invoking them, like whistling. Ritualistically adopted always leaving my window open to improve communication with Vaalbara by symbolically letting it come and go, and whistling to “invoke” it when I need it to be present. Made Vaalbara really happy and also it worked.

2. Vaalbara once expressed to me that it is a psychological manifestation of my previous trauma and childhood mental illness. It has also expressed to me that it is a sheyd by spiritual reasons. It is adamant that it is both. Ziv and I often try and work that out together because we’re both curious how it works. Ziv thinks Vaalbara’s belief is that it came to us as a mutable being and either accidentally or purposefully merged with my psyche. (“Yeah, I said ‘I think it’s like a merging thing’ so that’s basically what I said.” Ok, so I embellished.) I think it has something to do with this:

3. Lumi is questioning a fictotype. When xe first CIE we think xe absorbed a lot of my fictionflicker at the time, Pit (from Kid Icarus). Xe’s now starting to feel like when the fictionflicker faded for me, it didn’t for xet. So Lumi may be fictionkin.

4. Ziv has decided that, though she previously despised the idea of labeling her gender, she may really like the simplicity of the term agender. We’ve also been discussing sexuality, and apparently, since we never really talked about it before, Ziv thought it was just a fact that daimons don’t have sexuality. But Lumi said xe identifies as pansexual, so Ziv is now thinking she may be aroace. Meanwhile Tetri insists that that’s true and dæmons don’t have sexuality. I asked him if he’s also maybe aro and he resolutely dismissed the idea of sexuality labels for himself.

[hyperpotamianarch]

All right, so I have news for anyone who's interested in my Jewsade/Jewish dæmonism stuff! After not doing anything with it since I've hit a wall with no idea on how to actually write it, I am now considering using Maharal of Prague as a framing device that could connect the story to the main characters of His Dark Materials. Maharal is most well known for having rumored to have created a Golem - it's actually the most famous Golem story to exist - but he was more interesting a person than that. He was well studies in Philosophy and Kabbalah, as well as Astronomy and various other sciences. He was born in Poland about 30 years after the Alhambra decree in Spain, meaning he was a baby/young child at the time the supposed Jewsade may have occured. He was known to have conversed with Emperor Rudolph II later in life. In addition, his teachings later influenced the Chassidut movement.

I'm not really explaining his significance well, but he is an important figure who had the Golem legend grow around his character and fights against Blood Libels centuries after his death. And the fact that the Alethiometer was supposedly invented in Prague at around the time of his death helps.

You see, my idea of it currently is something along the lines of: Lyra, in the midst of studying the Alethiometer, finds some vague references to an early scholar named Long Loew. There is only one note from him which is very interesting, but there's very little about who he was and what are other stuff he said. After researching she finds a book that explains a bit more about him, which might be the heart of the story. That, or she'll slowly uncover hints and the story will progress in two parallel lines - one telling of the life of Rabbi Yehuda Loew of Prague and his struggles with the rising power of the Magisterium and another about Lyra uncovering his life and learning about the current state of Judaism under the Magisterium-dominated Europe. It will likely include some throwaway lines about the Jewsade and its outcome and about shifts in centers of Judaism. Some spotlight might also be given to Rabbi Mordechai Yaffeh (but only because I like him. He doesn't seem to have interacted with Maharal much even though he also served as the Rabbi of Prague for some time while Maharal was living in another city) and to some of Mahahral's students. There will also have to be some talk about the Shulchan Aruch and such books, but that's another thing.

Part of the idea here is also to remind people that Jews were involved in scientific development, to a degree. Some famous rabbis had exchanges with famous Astronomers. Due to how a Christian-dominated world generally works, though, you're unlikely to find discoveries made by Jewish scholars around the 16th-17th centuries. At least so I think, I'm far from an expert on that topic. Either way, I think this kind of story might lend itself easier to write. It does lose the angle of focusing on Sepharadi Jews, but I'm hardly qualified for that anyway. I think Maharal's type of philosophy might work very well with dæmons and the Alethiometer, though I do need to study it more (which I guess makes the fact one of my distant great uncles was a scholar of Maharal very convenient). I do still need to read the Secret Commonwealth to understand adult Lyra better and see how such a story might work - for example, might Pantalaimon go alone to the Jewish quarter of Prague when Lyra is unwilling to? What would each of them find out? What could really drive Lyra to check out one particular scholar? So, that's the bad news: after having a hard time starting to read the Secret Commonwealth, any progress that might be done is postponed until after I read it. I do intend to try and do it quickly, though.

So, yeah. I intend trying to talk about Jewish life in Lyra's world through the eyes of an old Jewish Rabbi, Philosopher and Kabbalah student, or maybe two or three of those. I will need to thouroughly research their history, but that's going to be fun (hopefully). Plus, I'm descended from Maharal! So this is kind of uncovering family history!

Thank you for reading, and have a wonderful day!

[lewis-winters]

Some additional dæmon!au headcanons, a continuation of this headcanon list.

Ok so I thought about it some more and decided to change Dick's dæmon from a Caracara to a Gyrfalcon. Still a raptor, but a larger one that has, historically, been used in falconry and hunting and is, in some European countries, a symbol of patriotism and national pride. Dick's daemon is a female, silver-streaked Gyrfalcon that settled sometime after college but before Fort Benning. Her name's Anahida, and she speaks like a queen. Like, literally, I imagine her voice sounds a lot like Helen McCrory's (gee, I wonder why). She's very large and eye catching, but she only speaks when spoken to-- which is rare. In a society as repressed as 1930s - 1940s America, I imagine speaking to another person's dæmon would be seen as rude or taboo. Because of that, Anahida barely speaks and thus, people often forget she's there. There are rumors too, that Dick's the son of a witch, because Anahida likes to fly far above and at a distance, farther than any human-dæmon bond should go. However, it isn't true. They just practiced a lot growing up. Dick's always wanted to fly, in some way or another, and practicing as well as testing how far they can both stretch from each other was their afternoon play time. It's weird. I know. But this is Dick we're talking about. Of course he'd do something like this.

Anahida is the only one allowed to berate Dick when he's being exceptionally petty or self-righteous. She keeps him in check. It never happens often, but it happens enough. Other than that, they're right as rain and very in-sync with each other.

Is anybody surprised that the only other person who will ever address Anahida directly is Lewis? Show of hands? None? Yeah, me too.

Liebgott's dæmon's name is Chaya and, after some pondering, I've come to the conclusion that she's a Bat-eared fox. Very chatty, too. She and Lieb are very blunt, but she's arguably the blunter one of the two. Where Lieb sometimes gives into the urge to hide or repress feelings, Chaya is willing to take more risk. She does this thing where she will boldly go one way, the way she knows is good for them both, stretching their bond even to its thinnest and most painful, just to get Lieb to finally concede and agree with her. They're both stubborn as all hell, that's the problem. Sometimes Lieb will deny himself things for a myriad of reasons. Chaya has no such qualms. She loves him, but she definitely thinks he's an idiot sometimes. It also sometimes extends to how Lieb gets really soft around people he cares about. In the wild, male Bat-eared foxes are the more nurturing of the young, while the females are the ones who go out and hunt. Kind of the same with Lieb and Chaya. Lieb takes care, he hovers and forgets that boundaries exist-- his own, and the person he's taking care of. But Chaya's the kind who remembers, and reminds Lieb that sometimes you can't give all of yourself away, no matter how much you want to. Does that make sense?

(Disclaimer: I gotta admit. The reason why I hesitated with Lieb was because I didn't want to accidentally be anti-Semitic. I grew up in a country that is primarily Christian and Muslim so I am only familiar with Islamophobic visual vocab, not so the anti-Semitic ones. I had to make sure the animals I assigned a Jewish man's literal soul to were not anti-Semitic or used in anti-Semitic imagery by Nazi propaganda in any way. So. Yeah. Um. Pigs, goats, lizards/reptiles, rats, rodent-adjacent, or any animal seen as "pests" or "vermin" were immediately struck out. Nope. Let's not.)

You wouldn't know it at first glance, but Web and his raven dæmon have a very intense love-hate relationship. Annabelle is a very act-first, introspection-never kind of thing. Web is the opposite. Sometimes, Annabelle will act before Web himself will, and she can be very, very vicious. Because of this, Web is afraid of her and Annabelle resents him. They never fight in public, they largely ignore each other, but often when they get into it... well. It gets almost... a bit too violent. Some of the others have never seen a human and a daemon hurt each other until they’ve met these two. Sometimes, Annabelle often thinks that she’s somebody else entirely, a completely different entity from Web, and sometimes, Web thinks she’s a changeling. That maybe some fae or other switched his real daemon out for this cursed one. It’s a really fractured, complicated relationship.

When they’re on the same wave length, though, they’re scary. The only thing they can seem to agree on is passionate and impulsive anger. Web will always regret it afterwards whereas Annabelle is always smug about it. They calm down after the war and they’re back home. During the war, though, they’re both a mess.

Joe Toye’s daemon is a doberman pinscher named Alessia who is just about as quiet and solemn as her human. Classic soldier daemon. He calls her Al for short. When he loses a leg, she doesn’t. I don’t think amputation in the daemon world works that way, at least not according to Pullman’s original text. Going back home with her after his amputation is easier because she’s there to encouraged him and hold him up when necessary. They make a good team. They share similar fears and insecurities so it’s easy for the both of them to understand each other and help each other through it.

Pat has a little american robin as a daemon. Which is really funny, honestly. Big tough guy like Pat, you’d think he’d have a big tough daemon for sure, but that’s not the case with him. He’s always been gentle and unassuming, Pat and so is his daemon. Her name’s  Aoibheann (pronounced ay-veen). She likes to sit on his shoulder and rarely flies far away from him. When they jumped, she stayed inside his jacket at all times, tucked away and close. The only time she flies is later on at peace time, when she knows they’re both safe and she can leave Pat for a few minutes without it being too much trouble.

Johnny’s daemon is a mongoose named Corentine, but he calls her Cora. She’s fiesty. Sobel’s rooster daemon, Julius, wasn’t very fond of her. In fact, he was downright frightened of her. It’s why Sobel won’t mess with Johnny. It’s really funny.

Perco’s daemon is in the same family. A weasel. A tiny little thing he can hold in both his hands. Her name’s Jackie. I have no idea why. But it fits.

Ralph Spina’s daemon is a raccoon. It’s adorable. His name’s Nimaphael. But he hates it and everybody just calls him Nim. Ralph carries him around like a baby on a sling, strapped to his chest. Unlike Harry and Saoirse, you can tease them about this. They’re aware it looks ridiculous. They also don’t care.

Bull’s daemon is a sun bear. I know. I didn’t see this coming, either. But I thought about it and... honestly? It fits. Not to mention Bull’s pretty big. He can carry her no problem. Her name’s Xanthia, by the way. And she’s very sweet, if only a little gruff in showing affection. She’s also not afraid to do what needs to be done. If she needs to have a go at an enemy’s daemon, then you know she’ll do it. She definitely isn’t afraid to get down and dirty. It scares the replacements for awhile, until they realize that she only does it to protect her own. 

I finally figured out what Merriell Shelton’s daemon is-- it’s a Jaguarundi. It’s a wild cat that looks to be a mix between a house cat and a mongoose. They’re fascinating and they hiss. A lot. It’s a perfect fit. Again, he name is Charlotte, but he calls her Lotte. Imagining them swaggering down the streets of 1940s New Orleans appeals to my aesthetic sense so much I cry just thinking about it.

BONUS:

Kitty Grogan’s daemon is, not surprisingly, a cat. But not a domesticated one. He looks like it at first glance, but he’s not. He’s an African Wild Cat and he’s a sarcastic little shit named Xaphania. Xaph for short. Send me a wink if you understand that reference.

[argentvive]

The Furnace Man, the Mermaid, Lyra, and the Alchemist - pt 3

Part 2 is here:

https://argentvive.tumblr.com/post/640601164102107136/the-furnace-man-and-the-mermaid-pt-2

V. Chemical Wedding

Lyndy Abraham’s definition of a Chemical Wedding:

The philosopher’s stone cannot be created until the lovers have died and their bodies putrefied in the mercurial waters. (p. 37)

Rosarium philosophorum, “Coniunctio”

Pullman gives us all three components of a Chemical Wedding--Van Dongen, Dinessa, and a wave of water, i.e., the Mercurial water.  And the lovers die.  

When Van Dongen comes down the stairs and sees Dinessa, everything in the alchemist’s laboratory changes.   This is surely Pullman’s most extraordinary run-on sentence in the entire series:

At once a tumult broke out. The stuffed crocodile hanging from the ceiling twisted in its chains, and writhed and lashed its tail and roared; a row of dusty glass bottles, gallon-sized or larger, containing strange specimens, fetuses, homunculi, cephalopods, glowed with light as the dead creatures inside beat their fists on the glass or sobbed with fury or hurled themselves from side to side; a metal bird in a dusty cage sang raucously; the water in Dinessa’s tank shrank away from Van Dongen and rose up in a great wave to stand suspended and trembling in the air, with the water dæmon inside, like an insect trapped in amber, though she saw her man and reached both arms out of the water and into the air, calling, “Cornelis! Cornelis!”

 All of this release of energy happens before Van Dongen and Dinessa unite, which they do immediately. thereafter.

It was all happening too quickly for anyone to stop. Van Dongen, crying “Dinessa!” hurled himself at the standing wave, and Dinessa burst out of it and into his arms.

      They came together in an explosion of steam and flame. For a second Lyra could see their faces, lurid, enraptured, pressing themselves together in a final embrace. Then they were gone, and something was happening among the machinery above the tank. Jets of superheated steam were forcing their way into the cylinders and slamming the pistons to and fro, making the connecting rods swing backwards and forwards as they turned a gigantic wheel, everything moving with the smooth ticking of lubricated machinery. (pp. 386-7)

The Chemical Wedding starts the alchemist’s steam engine, but Cornelis and Dinessa are “gone,”  Did the alchemist kill them?

  Lyra and Kubiček could only stand back in shock. Then she turned to the sorcerer, who was shutting his book with the air of having completed a long and arduous task.

What was that task?  What have we just seen?

VI. Homunculus or Golem?

Lyra asks Agrippa what’s he done, and he gives a shocking answer.  

“They are both fulfilling the destiny they were created for.”

  “They weren’t created for this!”

  “You know nothing about it. I arranged for their birth, I brought the dæmon here for this work, but her boy escaped. No matter. I arranged for you to find him and bring him here. Now your part is over, and you can leave.”

  “Their father betrayed them, and you did this to them!”

  “I am their father.”

In other words, Cornelis and Dinessa are homunculi, artificial human beings that some alchemists claimed to be able to create.  Paracelsus even provided an instructional manual in De natura rerum. Here’s an example of a homunculus from a 19th century illustration from Goethe’s Faust (Faust was an alchemist):

The story Cornelis tells Lyra of his birth and life in the Dutch Republic is not real--artificial memories for an artificial being..  We know that Agrippa can create homunculi because he has some in his Prague laboratory and they become active--”beat their fists”--when Cornelis appears (see quote above).  

Agrippa has now achieved (his version of) the Philosopher’s Stone--starting his engine but also transforming his menagerie of animals and birds:

  Lyra was dazed. The machinery was working faster now. She could feel the whole cellar trembling with the force of it. The crocodile had fallen still, apart from the slow swing of its tail; the homunculi in their bottle had stopped screaming and banging on the glass and were floating contentedly in the fluid that contained them, which was now glowing a faint and steady red; the metal bird in its cage, its golden feathers now gleaming with rich enamels and precious stones, was singing as sweetly as a nightingale. (p. 387)

Red and gold are the colors of the Philosopher’s Stone.  

A homunculus is not the only artificial human.  What about the Golem--should we consider that as an alternative inspiration for Cornelis?  According to the Jewish folktale, a medieval rabbi of Prague, Judah Loew ben Bezalel, created a humanlike creature from clay, the Golem.  There are three hints in the Furnace Man chapter that point to a Golem.  First, the chapter takes place in Prague.  Second, Agrippa is reciting “what might have been a spell in what might have been Hebrew.” Third, Agrippa is referred to not just as an alchemist, but as a sorcerer and a magician--though never a rabbi.  

For my part, I don’t think those small clues outweigh all the references to Agrippa as an alchemist, to the typical alchemical apparatus in his laboratory, and the specific mention of homunculi.  But I’m sure Pullman is aware of the Golem legend and wanted to acknowledge it in some way.  

So, finally, what role does this experience play in Lyra’s story?

Part 4.....

[idanit]

Yuletide 2020 recs

I made my previous rec post just a few months ago, but this one is more timely: here are my favourite stories from the Yuletide 2020 collection (well, from those I managed to read). They’re loosely grouped by canons or themes and they lean towards mystery, drama, worldbuilding and character studies rather than fluff or comedy, with some exceptions. The longest fic is 18K but most of them are much shorter. I tried to limit myself to one-sentence recs because otherwise I’d probably put off writing this post until autumn once again.

Travel, other species, fantastical places, odd cities

Baedeker's Guide to Trollesund His Dark Materials | G A few pages taken from a guide to a fictional city; the style is just right.

The Well-Informed Traveller (chapter 26, Octavia) Invisible Cities | G I think this fic builds on Calvino’s dreamlike, poetic images very well; it’s both in-depth and brief enough to leave the spiderweb city mysterious.

The Morning of the End of the World Invisible Cities | G A world without animals, reclaimed; it was interesting to see this city in a narrative with original characters rather than in the poetic puzzle of the canon. 

Shore of moss Strandbeest | G A beautiful piece about wind, brine and a wholly unfamiliar scent that will lead a beest somewhere far from everything it knows.

Interview Transcript: Three Jokes About Sex Always Coming Home | T An antropologist versus humour; I’m sure I’d appreciate this one even more if I read the canon, but I still found it thought-provoking and interesting.

Of No Mean Endeavour, and Not a Little Altered His Dark Materials | M (F/F) Mary Malone, her friendship and romance with Atal, her research on Earth, her relationship with Will, her new life with her dæmon; a multi-faceted story of (re)discovery.

The Only Place That's Real Christmas Cottage painting | G A wistful Christmassy horror story in which a visitor from a city gets lost in a small town, told from interesting points of view.

Teeth and Bones Baba Yaga and Vasilisa the Beautiful | G A very enjoyable fic about how Baba Yaga became who she is, with a lot of dry humour underneath the tale.

The snake fight portion of your thesis defense

great traditions of higher education T A pitch-perfect fictional dissertation about the tradition of snake fighting in academia.

From the Outbox of T. R. Matthews, Ph.D. T T.R. Matthews is one ruthless academic; this is a chilling story told through their correspondence with students.

Historical setting

The Sky Itself is Ringing The Emperor's Winding Sheet | G I admit I read this fic fandom-blind and I think it should not be read fandom-blind, but even so, it pulled me in with the way it sketches out the characters and their motivations, and the sensual descriptions.

Ciel D'Oro The Name of the Rose | G This is an excellently-written and researched microcosm of the novel: a gripping casefic that paints a fascinating picture of the times; there are monks, music, and murder.

The Unbroken Wheel Young Lady With Unicorn painting | G An intriguing interpretation of the painting which adds a bit of a delirious quality to it; beautifully written.

Jewish characters

The Cloud Mirror Where the Sky is Silver and the Earth is Brass | M An evocative scene set somewhere in a Polish forest during the WWII which manages to feel both real and unreal.

un mir zenen ale shvester Fiddler on the Roof (2018) | G A lovely extension of the canon centred around revisiting the past and looking into the future; I'm not familiar with this version of the play, so I was delighted to see a female fiddler. 

Characters receiving unexpected support

A World Without God Vincent & Theo (1990) | T A very human story about two imperfect brothers, art, and belief.

Perennial The Secret Garden | G An unexpected, but a very welcome AU in which Mary never makes it to England; it’s a story of her ayah in a lovely , refreshing change of perspective and background.

F/F, first experiences

Liberté, Egalité, Sororité A Little Princess | T (F/F) A sweet fic wherein Sara and Becky decide to act as friends rather than a young lady and her servant while on a trip to Paris.

Charcoal Sketches Portrait of a Lady on Fire | T (F/F) A quick look at what the first crushes and kisses of Héloïse and Marianne might have looked like—I was very hapy to finally read a pre-canon fic for the two of them.

M/M, old friendships

Knowing Without Knowing Agatha Christie's Poirot | T (M/M) A misunderstanding leading to some personal discoveries; the story takes place on a ship and is rather charming.

A Different Beat Raffles | G (M/M) Frustration, love, and a bit of a casefic, very enjoyable.

[featherquillpen]

References in “Choose Your Faces Wisely”

My dæmon AU of Good Omens, Choose Your Faces Wisely, has a lot of references and allusions in it, and some people in the comments were curious, so I decided to write a “DVD extra” explaining them. 

(Content warning ahead for sexual violence.)

Part 1.

In many cultures, including Japan, ancient Greece, and early Christianity, the butterfly is a symbol of the soul – the word “psyche,” from the Greek, means butterfly. It seemed right for the prototypical first human to have a dæmon that represented the soul in its purest form.

Eve’s goat dæmon has a dual meaning. In the Talmud, goats represent strength and endurance. But also, the term “scapegoat” has its origins in the Book of Leviticus, where a sacrificed goat is used to expunge the sins of a community. After the Fall, Eve is used as a scapegoat for humanity’s fall from grace.

Aziraphale laments privately that he wishes he were sure his nature wasn’t that of a lion. In Torah and Talmud, the lion represents majestic power and courage, but it also represents cruelty and oppression. 

Part 2.

Crawly wears a flax skirt and shawl in Ur because that was the garb of upper class women at the time: a skirt and a loosely draped shawl as a top – you can see this in Sumerian art. It’s dark instead of black because black was almost impossible to achieve using the dyes of the time.

When Aziraphale says that the townsfolk of Sodom and Gomorrah were horribly rude to Gabriel and Sandalphon, he is understating the case. In Genesis, when two unnamed angels come to visit Lot, a mob gathers around the house and demand Lot give the angels to the mob to be gang-raped.

Lot’s wife, who is turned into a pillar of salt when she disobeys an angel’s order not to look back at Sodom and Gomorrah as she flees, has no name in Torah, but a midrash (a Hebrew commentary on Torah) names her Edith. In the Talmud, the owl is a bad omen, though for the Greeks the little owl (Athene noctua) is a symbol of Athena. Bumah is the Arabic term for the little owl.

Aziraphale creates a ewe dæmon for himself as a tribute to the great Jewish matriarch Rachel (which means ewe.) There is too much to say about Rachel to do her justice here, but she was a great woman and Aziraphale has good reason to admire her.

Part 3.

It’s kind of a delicate matter to pick out a dæmon for Jesus, but tbh I’m Jewish and I’m not especially theologically bothered about it. I chose a dove because 1) doves were a traditional sacrificial animal at the time; 2) doves are a symbol of hope because a dove brought an olive branch to the Ark, signaling the end of the Flood; and 3) a dove is often the symbol of the Holy Spirit, and while this is probably some kind of deep-cut Christian heresy,  it makes some kind of sense to think of the Holy Spirit as Jesus’s dæmon. She’s named Zipporah because it means “little bird” in Hebrew.

 Crowley’s dæmon is named Lilith because... well, there’s entire dissertations to be said about Lilith, but in Jewish folklore she is Adam’s first wife, before Eve, who became a demon when she refused to submit to Adam. As a demon, she is a seductress, a mother of demons, and a baby-eater (or at least baby-killer.) There’s a whole tradition of badass feminist takes on Lilith as a woman who refuses patriarchal rule and is literally demonized for it, which is exactly the counter-narrative Crowley is referencing with Lilith, especially since she is canonically female-presenting in this part of the story. (Lilith is also symbolized by an owl in the Jewish tradition, linking her to my version of Edith; see above.)

Aziraphale’s sheepdog dæmon is a reference to Psalm 23: “The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want / He maketh me to lie down in green pastures [...]”

Part 4.

Aziraphale guises his dæmon as a she-wolf to gain respect in Rome because according to the origin myth of Rome, Romulus, the founder of Rome, and his brother Remus, were suckled as children by a she-wolf.

Part 5.

First of all, all due credit to the fic You, Soft and Only for giving me the idea of Aziraphale and Crowley meeting in medieval times as a nun and a noblewoman, respectively. 

The bible verse Aziraphale quotes is Luke 12:6.

As I explained in the endnotes of the fic, everything I wrote about the choir of sparrows and the Tree of Souls comes from Kabbalah, the Jewish mystic tradition. The myth of the Tree of Souls originates from Isaiah 57:16, where God talks about “the souls that I have made.” In the Talmud, this was interpreted to mean that God has already made all of the souls that will ever exist, and keeps them in some kind of treasury or storehouse. The Kabbalists ran with that and created this beautiful myth about a tree that drops souls on the Earth like ripe fruit, and a choir of sparrows that sings a song for every new soul. Crowley is really the one supernatural entity we meet in Good Omens who recognizes the value of individual human life, and thinks each soul worth its own celestial song.

I chose a swallow form for Edith mainly because of Psalm 84: “Yea, the sparrow hath found a house, and the swallow a nest for herself, where she may lay her young, at thine altars, O Lord.” Here, sparrows and swallows together represent righteous souls who flourish at God’s altars.

Also, in case anyone missed this subtext, when Crowley strokes Lilith’s wing and says it reminds her of something, but cuts herself off, she was going to say “It reminds me of my wings before I Fell.”

Finally, when Aziraphale has her impassioned spiel about Edith, what she’s carefully not quite saying about Lot is that when the mob threatened to gang-rape the angels in his home, he offered up his daughters for the mob to gang-rape instead.

Part 6.

Salamanders are, traditionally, immune to hellfire.

In Torah, leopards are pointed out as dangerous, swift, and cunning. But as it is said in Jeremiah 13:23, “Can a leopard change his spots?” Gabriel is asserting his power by manifesting a leopard dæmon, but he is also showing his immutability and resistance to change.

Part 7.

Naamah means “pleasant” in Hebrew, but it is also the name of a female demon, according to Kabbalah. 

Edith is a rooster in this part because: 1) in the Kabbalistic tradition, the rooster is a messenger of God who calls people to their morning prayers and supposedly banishes the demons of the night; 2) in the Talmud, the rooster is considered vain, impudent, and lustful because of his fine colors and his relentless pursuit of hens; 3) roosters were supposedly not allowed in the Temple in Jerusalem because they eat food from the ground that might make them unclean (a reference to the scene with Aziraphale and Gabriel) and 4) a rooster is also called a cock, and sometimes Aziraphale likes to show Crowley his cock in the back of the bookshop.

Part 8.

I already explained Edith’s serpent form in the endnotes of the fic, though I will add that serpents, like roosters, are considered unclean because they eat food from the dirt (sullying his celestial body with gross matter.) They are also considered a symbol of jealousy, as the serpent supposedly stirred up jealousy in the relationship between Adam and Eve (and I would argue that jealousy is a defining characteristic of Aziraphale.)

Aziraphale’s quote “Easier than air with air, if spirits embrace” is from Milton’s Paradise Lost, a major influence on Good Omens.

King David loved his friend Jonathan. People have been reading a love story between these two men for as long as there’s been a Bible. It’s hard not to, with passages like “Then Jonathan and David made a covenant, because he loved him as his own soul. And Jonathan stripped himself of the robe that was upon him, and gave it to David, and his garments, even to his sword, and to his bow, and to his girdle.” (Samuel 18) I reference the great Jewish songwriter Leonard Cohen in Aziraphale’s description of David and Jonathan touching each other’s dæmons. His song “Hallelujah” is about King David, among other things, and he sings, “Your faith was strong but you needed proof / You saw her bathing on the roof / Her beauty and the moonlight overthrew you.”

[ouroboros8ontology]

Get to Know Me Tag

I got tagged by: @mysticmachmir tysm! appreciate you appreciate your blogs

Name: Alli

Hogwarts House: ravenclaw :\ (can we start asking HDM related dæmon questions instead? ... owl, for what that’s worth)

Time: 8:43pm

Cats or Dogs: both. i love both. i have a dog tho

Favorite Animal: so many cool ones. i think magpies atm

Dream Job: coffee shop hag or some sorta prof

When This Blog Was Born: i made this guy in 2020, but have been collecting esoteric and jewish stuff on my main @onpyre for literal years

Reason For My URL: makhsheife is yiddish for witch (one spelling for it at least) and yagishna is a patronymic for baba yaga (as in daughter of baba yaga)

Followers that I’d like to know better: i don’t really have followers on here yet so... @ha-machshaifeh and @horrorjew who’s a mutual on my main 😌